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John Julius Furedy (born 30 June 1940; died 24 August 2016) was an Australian-Canadian psychologist specializing in psychophysiology, specifically autonomic conditioning and lie detection.

Early life and education

John Furedy was born Janos Gyula Furedi in Budapest, Hungary 30 June 1940. His parents were Jewish and many relatives died in the Holocaust, his twin sisters died of malnutrition in 1944, but John and his parents survived. His father, Bela, the manager of a tannery, was in forced labour during the war, ending on the Eastern Front. His mother, Magda (‘Dusi’), was helped by obtaining a schutzpass from the Swedish embassy. She and John were also helped by a Christian employee of the family (Manyi Hay) who was named Righteous among Nations by Yad Vashem in 2012. In 1949 the family escaped from Hungary and made their way to Paris where, after six months, they obtained visas for Australia. In Sydney Bela amd Dusi eventually established a successful tanning and hide export business. John was educated at Neutral Bay Public School, North Sydney Boys High. He obtained a scholarship to the University of Sydney in 1958. Originally enrolled in Arts-Law, he switched to an honours degree in psychology after securing first position in psychology I. He also secured first class honours in philosophy (1962). He was awarded the Lithgow Scholarship in psychology in 1959 and the university medal in psychology in 1962. He completed his master’s degree and doctorate at Sydney University, graduating in 1965.

Career

After a visiting fellowship at the University of Indiana (1965-1967) Furedy took a position in psychology at the University of Toronto, rising to full professor in 1975. He served on the Academic Board of the Governing Council of the University of Toronto from 1990-2005. He became professor emeritus in 2005, when he retired and returned to live in Sydney. [journal editing, society memberships, consultancies, etc]

Values and research

Furedy described himself as an “Anderson realist” acknowledging the influence of the Sydney University professor of philosophy, John Anderson, Challis Professor of Philosophy from 1927-1958. (ext link) A colleague and collaborator, Professor Emeritus Gershon Ben-Shakhar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has written of John’s research and academic values: “The most salient feature of John as a researcher and scholar was his critical thinking, which often led him to question prevalent theories and to criticize various researchers. John believed that truth would be advanced by the questioning of basic assumptions, by disciplined and disinterested inquiry. He held that truth was likely to emerge from the contest of ideas in a scholarly marketplace. He valued a conflict of ideas – a scholarly value he traced back to Socrates. Socratic thinking is ready to question all assumptions, is disciplined, and gets to fundamentals. John modelled Socratic thinking to his students.

He was suspicious of appeal to authority as an argument. He stood for appeal to facts, insisting on clear definitions at the outset of any discussion. In this conjunction, he deplored ad hominem remarks in scholarly arguments, and he often remarked on observing these, particularly at conference presentations. Among other things, John's critical mind led him to recognize and thoroughly understand the major flaws of the “Control Questions Technique” (CQT)— the most popular lie-detection method, widely used in North America, Israel, and some European countries. He published several articles and book chapters harshly criticizing the CQT, which he termed, a "psychological rubber hose" similar to “entrails reading”. Today, his views regarding the CQT are shared by almost the entire community of psychophysiological researchers.

Biofeedback, another popular application of psychophysiology, was also severely criticized by John, along with the misuse of the information processing computer metaphor in cognitive psychology. Biofeedback, another popular application of psychophysiology, was also severely criticized by John, along with the misuse of the information processing computer metaphor in cognitive psychology.”[Ref. IJP]. Pursuant to his opposition to the use of the polygraph in lie detection, Furedy supported Anti-polygraph.org, contributing comments to that organization’s book The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (ref. to be listed). In the 1990s he served on the U. S> Department of Defense Polygraph Institute’s Curriculum and Research Guidance Committee. The Committee advised against polygraph screening.Furedy was particularly concerned about preserving the highest standards of scholarship and merit in academia. He was critical of some of the guidelines proposed for research ethics boards being revised in universities in the 1990s, warning against applying a medical model of research to all human research. [Ref Safs obit and newsletter article]

In the late 1990s Furedy began collaboration with Professor Sakire Pogun and colleagues at the Centre for Brain Research at Ege University, Turkey. The collaborative research focused on the role of individual difference variables in the effects of smoking/nicotine on cognition, specifically verbal ability (ref Algan et al. 1997). Sex was shown to moderate the effects of nicotine on spatial ability in rats (Kanit et al., 1998).

Academic freedom

Concerned about the intrusion of political correctness into universities, Furedy became a founding member of [[Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship (SAFS)]] (1992) and member of the governing board 1992-2000 and president of the organization from 1993-1998. He was particularly sensitive to the “velvet totalitarianism,” and “the culture of comfort” as he phrased these, which he detected in many of the speech codes, disciplinary procedures, and hiring practicses that he saw emerging at the University of Toronto and academia generally in the late 1980s.

In a tribute to Furedy after his death, Janice Fiamengo wrote in the newsletter of the Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship, that John Furedy “was a voice of rare courage and clarity.” (SAFS newsletter September 2016).

Selected books and articles

Furedy, C. & Furedy, J.J (1985). Critical thinking: Toward research and dialogue. New directions for teaching and learning, 23, 51-69.

Furedy, J.J. (1996). The North American polygraph and psychophysiology: disinterested, uninterested, and interested perspectives. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 21, 97-105.

Furedy, J. J. (1993). The ‘control’ question ‘test’ (CQT) polygrapher's dilemma: logico-ethical considerations for psychophysiological practitioners and researchers. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 15, 363-267.

Furedy, J.J. & Heslegrave, R.J. (1991). The forensic use of the polygraph: A psychophysiological analysis of current trends and future prospects. In: J.R. Jennings, P.K. Ackles and M.G.H. Coles (eds.), Advances in Psychophysiology, 4, Jessica Kingsley Publishers Ltd.

References

External Links

Website: http://www.psych.utoronto.ca/users/furedy/